Mischa Barton: “I Hit Rock Bottom”

Mischa Barton is denying she she had a mental breakdown. Instead she blames it on her teeth.

The ‘Beautiful Life‘ star was hospitalized July 15 by police and taken to L.A.’s Cedars-Sinai Medical Center for mental health issues.

But she tells a New York magazine that it was all due to oral surgery and the pain killers involved.

“It was a nightmare,” she said to Time Out New York. “I’ve never had surgery before — it all went wrong and I had to have a second surgery and it almost delayed shooting because it was a nightmare to me, because I couldn’t deal with the thought of not getting there on time. So with the travel and surgery and prep for the show, it was hell.”

“I went through a tough spot where everything compounded on me, and it was like a perfect storm, like everything was happening to me at once,” she added. “I was down in the dumps about everything there for a while.”

Although she denied having an actual mental breakdown, she still opened up about hitting rock bottom. “But it was pretty bad,” she said. “It didn’t last that long… Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom about things and have to get the most stressed out just to feel better again. I got completely stressed out and couldn’t handle everything, and now I feel really in control.”

Mischa will be playing an aging, troubled model in the new CW series, produced by Ashton Kutcher and also starring Elle Macpherson.